Squeeze Cone Vanilla Candy, 4-oz. tube
Amurol ConfectionsRemember a few years back when there was all that fuss about those serial killer trading cards? Believe me, there are far more insidious products lurking in our nation's five-and-dime stores. If the family-values brigade is really worried about the plummeting morals of America's youth, they ought to take a long, hard look at Squeeze Cone, a vanilla-flavored candy that makes the serial killer cards look wholesome by comparison. You've heard of candy corn? Well this is candy porn.
Squeeze Cone comes in a plastic tube and, as its name implies, is squeezable. The tube itself, which is about five inches long, features an assortment of playful graphics but is otherwise no different than the ones used for toothpaste. Squeeze Cone's prurient appeal begins to manifest itself, however, in the tube's two-inch-long cap, a tapered, prow-like affair that lends an unmistakably phallic dimension to the overall package design. Or, in the words of almost everyone to whom I've showed this product, "Man, is that a sex toy or what?"
It gets better. When you remove the cap and squeeze, Squeeze Cone turns out to be a semi-clear, viscous liquid that spurts out of the tube sort of like -- well, you get the idea. And as one acquaintance of mine remarked when I let him try some Squeeze Cone, "Hey, tastes better than the real thing!"
If you can get past the libidinous subtext, the obvious way to eat Squeeze Cone is to squeeze a bit onto your fingertip and then lick it off. My friend s description notwithstanding, the stuff is sort of sickly sweet, and I find it hard to imagine even the most sugar-obsessed kid downing it in large doses. But according to the nutritional information on the package, the entire tube contains only three servings, which presents the extremely off-putting prospect of consuming a third of a tube of Squeeze Cone in one sitting. The very thought of this is far more offensive than any of the product's sexual overtones -- as Potter Stewart once remarked, I may not be able to define obscenity, but I know it when I see it, and this is it.
Amurol Confections, 2800 N. Rt. 47, Yorkville, IL 60560
Update: No sooner had I written about Armour Star Pork Brains than my pal Ray sent me a can of Kelly's Pork Brains, marketed by Kelly Foods, a regional brand based in Tennessee. The two products seem largely identical, except that the Kelly's can is a bit smaller than Armour's, weighing in at 5 ounces compared to Armour's 5.5 -- personally, I count this as progress. The Kelly's package label is an improvement over Armour's as well: no brains-related recipes and no noxious photo of cooked brains, plus there s a jolly little leprechaun in a shamrock-imprinted chef s hat -- presumably the Kelly s mascot -- who looks quite excited to be endorsing pork brains. Of course, an empty can of brains would be best of all, but at least Kelly's seems to be moving in that direction.
Meanwhile, the collector in me is hooked. Clearly suffering from brains on the brain, I now find myself obsessed with stocking an entire cupboard with as many brands of pork brains as possible. Readers willing to help out should direct their contributions to me here at Inconspicuous Headquarters; the most entertaining submissions will be rewarded with a prize from the "Inconspicuous Consumption" product archives.
Kelly Foods, Inc., 513 Airwaves Blvd., Jackson, TN 38301